14473037 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 29, 2018)

Ex Parte JAISINGHANI et al

Patent Trial and Appeal BoardOct 29, 2018

14473037 (P.T.A.B. Oct. 29, 2018)

UNITED STA TES p A TENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE APPLICATION NO. FILING DATE FIRST NAMED INVENTOR 14/473,037 08/29/2014 A VIN ASH JAISINGHANI 35690 7590 10/31/2018 MEYERTONS, HOOD, KIVLIN, KOWERT & GOETZEL, P.C. P.O. BOX 398 AUSTIN, TX 78767-0398 UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE United States Patent and Trademark Office Address: COMMISSIONER FOR PATENTS P.O. Box 1450 Alexandria, Virginia 22313-1450 www .uspto.gov ATTORNEY DOCKET NO. CONFIRMATION NO. 5924-85501 1002 EXAMINER BARRY, LANCE LEONARD ART UNIT PAPER NUMBER 2448 NOTIFICATION DATE DELIVERY MODE 10/31/2018 ELECTRONIC Please find below and/or attached an Office communication concerning this application or proceeding. The time period for reply, if any, is set in the attached communication. Notice of the Office communication was sent electronically on above-indicated "Notification Date" to the following e-mail address(es): patent_docketing@intprop.com PTOL-90A (Rev. 04/07) UNITED STATES PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE BEFORE THE PATENT TRIAL AND APPEAL BOARD Ex parte A VINASH JAISINGHANI, RETO KRAMER, CHRISTOPHER WHITAKER, NISHANTH SHANKARAN, JA YKUMAR H. GOSAR, JEFFREY L. BAKER, DANIEL OSIECKI, DANNY RABBANI, PRASHANT JAYARAMAN, ADAM M. THOMAS, and VENKATES P ARAMASIV AM BALAKRISHNAN Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 1 Technology Center 2400 Before ERIC B. CHEN, JON M. JURGOV AN, and DAVID J. CUTITTA II, Administrative Patent Judges. CUTITTA, Administrative Patent Judge. DECISION ON APPEAL Appellants seek our review under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 134(a) of the Examiner's Final decision rejecting claims 1-5 and 24--38, which are all the claims pending in the application. We have jurisdiction under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 6(b). We REVERSE. 1 Appellants identify Amazon Technologies, Inc. as the real party in interest. See Appeal Br. 2. Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 STATEMENT OF THE CASE Invention Appellants' invention relates to "enabl[ing] a user to upgrade a stack of resources by providing a template that reflects the desired end state of the stack." Spec., Abstract. 2 Illustrative Claim Claims 1, 26, and 33 are independent. Claim 1 is illustrative and is reproduced below with dispositive limitation at issue italicized. 1. A computer implemented method for updating resources in a network-accessible service environment, said method comprising: instantiating, by a service provider system, a stack of resources that operate together to provide at least one network- accessible service, the stack of resources being associated with a first template; receiving, by the service provider system, a request to update the stack of resources, the request including a second template that specifies at least one difference from the first template's specification for the stack of resources; computing, by the service provider system, one or more differences for one or more resources in the stack, the one or more differences introduced by the second template; and determining, by the service provider system and based at least in part on one or more computed differences, a set of changes that should be made to the resources of the stack; 2 Throughout this Decision, we refer to: (1) Appellants' Specification filed August 29, 2014 ("Spec."); (2) the Final Office Action mailed January 31, 2017 ("Final Act."); (3) the Appeal Brief filed July 31, 2017 ("Appeal Br."); (4) the Examiner's Answer mailed October 11, 2017 ("Ans."); and (5) the Reply Brief filed December 11, 2017 ("Reply Br."). 2 Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 determining, by the service provider system, whether the changes can be implemented as a running update or require a destructive update; and for changes that require the destructive update, creating at least one new resource, adding the new resource into the stack, and removing a previous version of said resource from the stack. Appeal Br. 23. REFERENCES The prior art relied upon by the Examiner in rejecting the claims on appeal includes: Shepard et al. US 2005/0228798 Al Oct. 13, 2005 ("Shepard") Blewer et al. US 2007/0043716 Al Feb.22,2007 ("Bl ewer") Bishop et al. US 2008/0126778 Al May 29, 2008 ("Bishop") Bedell et al. US 7,559,048 Bl July 7, 2009 ("Bedell") Kramer et al. US 2011/0320605 Al Dec. 29, 2011 ("Kramer") Maiorano et al. US 2015/0178069 Al June 25, 2015 ("Maiorano") REJECTI0NS 3 Claims 1, 3-5, 24, 26, 28-30, 32, 33, and 35-37 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ I03(a) as being unpatentable over Kramer, Bishop, Maiorano, and Shepard. Final Act. 4--8. 3 The Examiner indicates the rejections under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 112, first and second paragraph are withdrawn. See Ans. 2-3. 3 Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 Claims 2, 25, 27, and 34 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Kramer, Bishop, Maiorano, Shepard, and Bedell. Final Act. 8-10. Claims 31 and 38 stand rejected under 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) as being unpatentable over Kramer, Bishop, Maiorano, Shepard, and Bedell, and Blewer. Final Act. 10. Our review in this appeal is limited only to the above rejections and issues raised by Appellants. Arguments not made are waived. See 37 C.F.R. Â§ 4I.37(c)(1)(iv)(2014). ISSUE Based on Appellants' arguments, the dispositive issue presented on appeal is whether the Examiner errs in finding Kramer teaches or suggests "computing, by the service provider system, one or more differences for one or more resources in the stack, the one or more differences introduced by the second template," as recited in claim 1. CONTENTIONS AND ANALYSIS In support of the rejection of claim 1, the Examiner finds Kramer's discussion of receiving a new template and parsing the template teaches or suggests the limitation at issue. Final Act. 5 ( citing Kramer ,r,r 32, 72); Ans. 4---6 (citing Kramer ,r,r 15, 16, 38). Appellants argue Kramer does not teach computing differences for a resource in a stack of resources specified in a first template, the differences being introduced by a second template for the same stack because Kramer provides an entirely new stack. See Appeal Br. 9. 4 Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 Specifically, Appellants argue: [C]laim 1 refers to a first template's specification for a stack of resources that operate together to provide at least one network- accessible service. Appellant[ s '] claim 1 also recites that this same stack of resources is updated according to a second template that specifies at least one difference from the first template's specification for the same stack of resources. In contrast, while the above par. [0038] of Kramer does describe re-use and modification of templates themselves to create new templates, there is no mention of computing one or more differences for one or more resources in an instantiated stack of resources specified in a first template, the one or more differences introduced by the second template for the same stack of resources. Instead, in Kramer, a re-used or modified template would be used to provision an entirely new and distinct stack of resources, not to modify a stack of resources that had been instantiated according to a different template. There is no teaching in Kramer, or any of the other cited references, of computing differences between two templates for the same stack of resources of a network-accessible service[.] Appeal Br. 9. We find Appellants' arguments persuasive. The Examiner does not, on the record before us, show that Kramer's discussion of receiving "a new template from a user . . . to provision a stack of multiple, different network resources on behalf of the user" teaches or suggests computing differences, introduced by the new template, for one or more resources in the stack, as claimed. See Final Act. 4--6; Ans. 2-11. The Examiner responds to Appellants' arguments above by concluding that "attacking Kramer individually cannot establish non- obviousness where the rejection is based upon the combined teaching of Kramer and Shepard (in combination with Bishop and Maiorano)." Ans. 4. 5 Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 The Examiner further finds "Kramer would have suggested the claimed computing step, viz., 'computing, by the service provider system, one or more differences for one or more resources in the stack, the one or more differences introduced by the second template"' and Shepard teaches the determining limitation. Ans. 5, 6 ("Shepard's determining the files to be added or existing files to be replaced would have suggested the claimed 'determining, by the service provider system and based at least in part on one or more computed differences, a set of changes that should be made [there ]to."'). The Examiner, however, does not show how Shepard in combination with Kramer teaches the claimed computing step but instead relies only on the teachings of Kramer. Therefore, the Examiner's response that Appellants argue the references individually does not specifically address Appellants' arguments distinguishing the teachings of Kramer. See Appeal Br. 9. Accordingly, the Examiner has not shown how Kramer, alone or in combination with the other cited references, teaches or suggests the disputed limitation, as claimed. Because we agree with at least one of the dispositive arguments advanced by Appellants for claim 1, we need not reach the merits of Appellants' other contentions. We, therefore, do not sustain the Examiner's 35 U.S.C. Â§ 103(a) rejection of claim 1. We also do not sustain the rejection of independent claims 26 and 33, which recite limitations commensurate in scope with claim 1. We, likewise, do not sustain the rejections of dependent claims 2-5, 24, 25, 27-32, and 34--38. 6 Appeal2018-001872 Application 14/473,037 DECISION We reverse the Examiner's decision to reject claims 1-5, and 24--38. REVERSED 7